256 AS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR-I 



history such as have now been developed in so many of 

 our universities and colleges. 



During my stay as resident graduate at Yale after my 

 return from Europe in 1856, I often discussed the subject 

 with my old friend and companion Oilman, now president 

 of the Carnegie Institution, and with my beloved instruc 

 tor, Professor Porter. Both were kind enough to urge me 

 to remain at New Haven, assuring me that in time a profes 

 sorship would be established. To promote this I wrote an 

 article on &quot; German Instruction in General History,&quot; 

 which was well received when published in the New Eng- 

 lander,&quot; and prepared sundry lectures, which were re 

 ceived by the university people and by the New York press 

 more favorably than I now think they deserved. But there 

 seemed, after all, no chance for a professorship devoted to 

 this line of study. More and more, too, I felt that even if I 

 were called to a historical professorship at Yale, the old- 

 fashioned orthodoxy which then prevailed must fetter me : 

 I could not utter the shibboleths then demanded, and the 

 future seemed dark indeed. Yet my belief in the value 

 of better historical instruction in our universities grew 

 more and more, and a most happy impulse was now given 

 to my thinking by a book which I read and reread 

 Stanley s &quot;Life of Arnold.&quot; It showed me much, but 

 especially two things: first, how effective history might 

 be made in bringing young men into fruitful trains of 

 thought regarding present politics; and, secondly, how 

 real an influence an earnest teacher might thus exercise 

 upon his country. 



While in this state of mind I met my class assembled at 

 the Yale commencement of 1856 to take the master s de 

 gree in course, after the manner of those days. This was 

 the turning-point with me. I had been for some time more 

 and more uneasy and unhappy because my way did not 

 seem to clear; but at this commencement of 1856, while 

 lounging among my classmates in the college yard, I heard 

 some one say that President Wayland of Brown University 

 was addressing the graduates in the Hall of the Alumni. 



